Blah Blah Blah

Nick Freitas, a former Virginia state legislator and current Internet content creator, offered an interesting take on Congressional Republicans' spending-cutting fecklessness. He posited that the Democrats appear far more willing than Republicans to lose elections in order to achieve long-term gains for their agendas and policies. They know that, eventually, they'll wind up back in power, and not everything they did during their previous terms will be undone by the GOP when it gains majority status. Because the GOP is less willing to take political risk in pursuit of its (purported) agendas and policies.

I found this a bit hard to agree with on first consideration, because the Dems treat every election as an existential crisis. Considering the actual history of the nation's culture and government across the twenty-first century, though, it's pretty hard to dispute.

The latest iteration of budget-making (busting, if we are honest) further validates the conclusion. Trump's Big Beautiful Bill (already going down in history as the BBB) was the GOP's singular chance this year to make some real cuts and to act on many of DOGE's discoveries. Instead, we get a few nibbles, a lot of pork, and the GOP rank-and-file saying "swing district GOP Congresspersons need to bring home the bacon so they don't lose their seats."

In other words, business as usual, excused by short-term politics, and the debt just continues to grow. Meanwhile, thanks in no small part to Trump's profound misunderstanding of trade, the chances of the GOP retaining the House in the 2026 mid-term elections are pretty slim. The gambling markets have the Dems at nearly 80% to take over, which makes "lade with pork so we don't lose the House" an even lamer excuse not to do what desperately needs to be done.

Of course, there's still a year and a half left in this Congressional term, and much can (and will) change between now and Autumn 2026. What I and many others in brief moments of starry-eyed naivete hoped for was the GOP to finally walk the walk. DOGE, sloppy as it was, gave them a blueprint and, with the outrage the public felt at revelations about endless absurdities, there was sentiment and momentum to grab. Instead, we got... blah blah blah.

Oh, I'm sorry, a Big Beautiful Bill, which may be big but is certainly not beautiful.

Trump's election was, I still believe, a very necessary reset. No matter the Trump chaos, the Great Rejection was about far more than the occupant of the White House. I covered what we'd be looking at from the Dems had Harris won here, and no matter if the GOP gets wiped out of the House in the mid-terms, the Left's agenda suffered a serious setback.

But pieces of it will remain even after Trump completes his term. The Left's big mouths are insisting that they need not only to persevere in the policies that cost them so dearly this past election, they need to double down. The next Democrat to win the Presidency will very likely do as Biden did - run on a moderate platform, but sprint leftward the moment he or she takes the oath of office.

Every iteration of the Left ratchets government upward, and expands the Overton Window (the range of policies considered "normal") leftward. Despite former Democrats like Joe Rogan and Donald Trump become tagged as "right wing" and liberal stalwart Bill Maher points out that the Left has gone bonkers, the shift leftward never rebounds fully. Ditto for spending. Our debt is unfathomable, a quarter of federal tax revenue is going to debt service, and the Left is perfectly fine with all of that. Republicans know this is a disaster in the offing, and pay lots of lip service to that notion, but aren't willing to take any but the most trivial of risks to try and right the ship. Instead, they worry about keeping their jobs one more election cycle, no matter that in doing so they abet the disaster, and no matter that the "Democrat-Lite" approach was tried under GWB and failed miserably.

It is the rare politician who says "I'm going to do the right thing for the nation even if it costs me my job." One can argue that "my job" is validated or repudiated by the voters, and the voters are voting to bring home the bacon. But a good representative should sell cost cuts to his constituents by pointing out that this wave of bacon may taste good now, but will harm them in the bigger picture. Who is doing that apart from a small handful of GOPers (who are routinely mocked and criticized by people who really should know better)?

Unless Congress grows a pair and starts cutting government, all the Great Reset will have accomplished is a brief slow-down of the disaster. Not from a spending angle - oh, no, the Republicans are great at spending when they're in power - but from a policy perspective. Yes, Trump's trade war is a giant unforced error born of a very wrong view of things, but the rejection of green insanity, the abandonment of ESG and DEI, the deregulatory moves, and some other positives will do the nation good and buy some time.

What the GOP does with that time?

I'm not optimistic.

Why?

Because Republican voters heap scorn on the GOPers in Congress who dare argue against bloated, pork-laden omnibus bills, rather than the ones who stuff them with all that pork.

Is that being "realistic?" Or are they simply excusing the culprits again and again?

People fixate on the Presidency, and the power of the Executive is mighty and getting mightier, but real change must come from Congress. Congress typically has an approval rating in the teens. Out of a hundred. Yet the re-election rate in Congress is typically over 85%.

Who do we blame for that?